The English Trade Union Congress, meeting in Glasgow, 
adopted at its session of September 8th a resolution which the 
socialists of the European continent will hardly be able to ignore. 

The Zurich Committee which, in conformity with the Brussels 
1891 resolutions, was entrusted with the preparations for the next 
congress of the International in 1893, sent a letter of invitation to 
the Trade Union Congress. Despite the repeated complaints of the 
secretary of the Gas Union, Comrade Will Thorne, during three 
days of the proceedings, this letter was neither produced nor read 
to the Congress, which as a result never had an opportunity to 
express its opinion about the Zurich invitation. 

Finally, Matkin proposed a motion that the Parliamentary 
Committee of the Trade Union Congress*” should be entrusted 
with the convening of an international congress to discuss and pass 
a resolution on an international legal eight-hour working day. 

Comrade Parnell (who went to the Paris congress of 1889) and 
Comrade Quelch replied that two international workers’ congres- 
ses had already been called for 1893, one to meet in Zurich, the 
other in Chicago*”; that the Zurich provisional committee had 
invited the Trade Union Congress to participate in the Zurich 
congress, and that instead of calling a third congress the invitation 
to the Zurich congress should be accepted. 

In reply, the representatives of the old conservative unions 
stated that the Zurich and Chicago congresses had not been 
convened by the English Trade Unions; that the workers on the 
Continent were badly organised and weak compared to the 

To National Council of Socialist Workers’ Party of Spain 327 

English, and that it was inappropriate for the English to make 
themselves responsible for all the wild Theories of continental 
socialism, etc. etc. Only then was the invitation of our Zurich 
Committee read out. 

In the end the Zurich Committee was turned down by 189 votes 
against 97, and the proposal to summon “immediately” an 
international congress to discuss and pass a resolution on the 
international legal eight-hour working day was approved. 

These two votes constitute an offence directed against the 
organised and socialist proletariat of the whole European Conti- 
nent. Let us hope that the most advanced sectors of the English 
proletariat who, while being socialists at heart, are still frightened 
of the name and have been taken in by the old conservatives; that 
these more intelligent and bolder elements will be able to make 
amends for the mistake at the next congress. 

Meanwhile it seems appropriate that the continental workers 
save their dignity in the face of the insult contained in the said 
resolutions, and this is why I have informed our friends in France 
and Germany of the events in Glasgow, hoping that they will agree 
on what line of action to follow; as the French comrades will be 
celebrating their Marseilles congress*™* in a few days, they will be 
able to make a first reply to the Trade Union Congress. 

But in my capacity as ex-secretary for Spain on the General 
Council of the old International of glorious memory, I believe it 
my duty to communicate to the Spanish National Council an event 
which concerns the Spanish comrades no less than those of other 
countries. 

Greetings and social revolution. 

: : ; manuscript 

Works, First Russian Edition, Vol. XXIX, Translated from the Spanish